Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to wide dynamic range depth imaging in a structured light imaging device.
Description of the Related Art
In structured light imaging devices, a projector-camera pair is used to estimate the three-dimensional (3D) depth of a scene and shape of objects in the scene. The principle behind structured light imaging is to project patterns on objects/scenes of interest and capture images with the projected pattern. The depth is estimated based on variations of the pattern in the captured image in comparison to the projected pattern.
The amount of light reflected by the objects in the scene varies depending on object properties such as color, albedo (reflectance) etc. The light incident on the objects is a combination of ambient light and light from the projector. For a fixed camera exposure time and projector projection time, some objects may be under-exposed and other objects may be over-exposed. Darker objects tend to be under-exposed and the projected pattern is not detected in these regions. Conversely, brighter objects may reflect the projected pattern and the ambient light and be over-exposed, which makes the pattern undetectable in such regions.